Often an incomplete operational task does not have an immediate impact on an operation. Instead, the risk compounds and leads to a failure in a week or a month’s time. When was the last time your plant tripped or suffered a degradation in performance because an operational task was not completed a week or month ago? Maybe the same operational task is always missed and one day it bites you. Often the failure is infrequent and ‘lost in the noise’ or put down to ‘bad luck’ when in fact it can be easily eliminated.
Operational tasks can span critical safety checks, critical processing checks, basic equipment reliability checks and housekeeping. When a combination of equipment reliability checks and housekeeping tasks are not completed it can lead to maintenance teams rebuilding a pump in a sump full of slurry and compromise the mean time between failure of the rebuild. Not only does that lead to further future production risk but also the potential for lower morale and reduction of quality in other areas.
Furthermore, when housekeeping is poor, it can be difficult to identify when the process is out of control because new overflows and spillages are hard to recognise. Spillages can hide potentially hazardous energy sources and/or lead to premature failure of the equipment covered by the spillage. Good housekeeping is often correlated with and a lead indicator of safety performance and general work quality across an operation.
Ensuring that simple, regular operational activities are identified, scheduled and completed can be the difference between keeping people safe, reaching production targets and staying under budget or not. That is why Mipac created TCard. TCard is a digital solution that enhances stability through teamwork, structure, and insight within the foundations of your operations management procedures. It has been designed to complement your ERP and CMMS, offering features and insight to easily and efficiently plan, schedule and manage operational activities.
Critical areas within your operation where TCard can be utilised
The list of regular and routine operational tasks may seem endless. However, TCard can help you better manage these tasks whilst increasing employee engagement and awareness of the drivers to safety, production and budget success within your operation. TCard enables you to see when things are going out of control by detecting spillage and overflows. TCard allows you to schedule regular activities across your crews to balance the load and ensure you maintain effective housekeeping, improving safety and enhancing stability.
Enhancing safety
Effective housekeeping and critical safety checks are crucial to safe workplaces and can eliminate many workplace hazards. Housekeeping helps get the job done safely, improves productivity and enhances team morale.
Some examples of hazards that can be prevented or enhanced via housekeeping and critical safety checks include:
- Slips, trips and falls
- Fire and burns
- Access to operational safety equipment such as emergency showers and eyewash
- Availability of PPE and consumable inventories
- Exposure to toxic or unhygienic materials
- Falling objects
Enhancing operational efficiency
Effective operational task management is critical to increasing operational efficiency and preventing downtime from equipment failure. Similarly, when scheduling tasks, it is important to balance the load of tasks across a shift and across different crews to ensure all tasks can be completed. TCard makes it easy to spread the load and provides operators direct access to controlled work instructions and procedures where and when the activity is being performed to maximise consistency.
As a 24/7 operational management solution, TCard makes it easy for operators, supervisors and management to see what tasks are remaining from the previous shift and which tasks are outstanding throughout the current shift. This means that operators can help out their mate to ensure targets are achieved as a team. Similarly, supervisors and management can assess where additional resources are required to ensure critical operational activities are completed.
Enhancing awareness of your operation
As a cloud-based solution that is suitable for mobile and tablet use, TCard provides real-time feedback and status of activities. Bringing data into a central location helps provide visibility across the operations and facilitates automated reporting. It allows you to take control of your operation whilst having better visibility and insight across your operation and team.
TCard helps create a better understanding and connection to the costs of tasks not done. It is a platform that helps you explore the critical areas within your operation that can often be missed or need to be improved.
When these missed tasks are brought to light and corrected, you will start to see the true value that TCard brings to your operation. This can be through several ways including, increased financial gains, enhanced capability within your team and operation and as a solution to reduce downtime, optimise existing operations and encourage a better and safer workplace environment.
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